About Nico


I'm a freelance writer and poet based in Toronto, Canada.


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Spring 2013 garden prep

By Nico on Wednesday the 1st of May, 2013 at 4:48 pm

Soil

It may have snowed two weeks ago, and rained for a week solid, but the sun’s out today, and warm weather has been predicted by the augurs going forward, so I’m doing it. I’m prepping the garden for 2013. Continue reading »

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It Grows: Tomato Edition

By Nico on Friday the 29th of June, 2012 at 12:04 pm

Tomatoes, June 2012

Tomatoes, June 2012

The tomatoes are already starting to come in, and they look adorable.

Many other plants have flowered, and I took a few pictures, but haven’t had a chance to put them up, and now look: fruit. Already. Who knew?

The blueberries are still very green, and while I’ve eaten most of the strawberries, two seem to be left on the vine, waiting to ripen.

I’ve almost gathered enough raspberries to make jam. I just hope they don’t go off before I get the chance.

Jalapeños, June 2012

Jalapeños, June 2012

The jalapeños, too, are starting to come in. I need to figure out something to do with them. I didn’t expect them to start so early. This just further illustrates that I have absolutely no idea what I’m doing when it comes to this kind of thing.

For some reason, I thought they’d be later, popping out around the same time as sweet red peppers, simply because when I make red pepper jelly, I buy them at the same time.

Supermarkets, you have ruined me. I have no idea what foods happen when.

Ideas?

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Tomatoes, raspberries and more delicious strawberries

By Nico on Saturday the 16th of June, 2012 at 5:39 pm

Garden, June 2012

Garden, June 2012

Tons of activity in my garden this week. It’s very exciting, though I think I may have over planted again.

The zucchini in the bottom left hand corner is getting big. It’s starting to over run my asparagus, and it’s only been a couple of weeks. Not sure how to fix that.

I finally got around to staking the tomato plants, and added four new cherry tomato plants. I’m hoping there’s enough space between them to grow properly.

The stakes look really big. I find it hard to believe that my tiny little plants will one day grow up to be six feet tall, but the dude at the garden centre assured me they can indeed grow that high. We’ll see.

Raspberries, June 2012

Raspberries, June 2012

The raspberries are just starting to come in. I saw about a dozen ripe ones today, including this little guy on the left. The raspberry bushes run all along the back fence, so I imagine I’ll have enough berries to can for weeks.

Last week the strawberries were starting to come in. Last night two of them were ripe enough to clip. Talk about eating local. A few more are starting to turn red – I took a picture for Twitter, you can see them here. It doesn’t look like there will be enough to jam with, at least not this year, but I’ll be able to nom a few as the summer gets on.

The blueberry bush seems to be doing ok. The berries are still very green though. Looks like it’ll be a while before I get to try them out.

Goth Salad, June 2012

Goth Salad, June 2012

I also mentioned last week that my goth salad was beginning to grow yellow flowers. Well, more have since come in. It’s like a little garden of sunshine in the afternoon shade.

Yellow seems to be a popular colour for flowers. I don’t know if you can see it in the image above, but my jalapeño plant is starting to get little yellow flowers, as are the two larger tomato plants. I’ll get pics when the flowers come in more fully.

I have no idea if the flowers are edible. I don’t see why not? I haven’t actually tried to eat the salad yet, but I think I’ll clip some to go with tonight’s dinner.

All in all, things seem to be going well in the Mara-McKay Great Garden Experiment of 2012.

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